2015 was a year of landmark for Startups in india, mainly in the field of technology many companies reached heights with around 114 companies raised series A rounds of funding which amounted nearly Rs. 3,595 crores (roughly $542 million).
Series A round funding is the very first stage when it comes to funding a company which receives form VC firms then comes the seed funding rounds from angel investors. This happens when a company has just started to generate some revenue from it’s business model or proves that the business model can last long, remember the business is not yet making any profit and will require funds to sustain.
Series A investors mostly include venture capital funds or angel investors who are will to take risk in your business and invest. Surprisingly the most funded player in 2015 was Ola which got roughly 6008 crores ($900 million) in funding while Cardekho was the smallest funding in 2015 which got roughly Rs. 333 crores ( $50 million ) in funding
From a funding perspective view Sequoia Capital leads the pack with investments in top 9 companies, Tiger Global did investment in top 6 companies, Steadview did investment in five startups while SoftBank has four investments in 2015.
Paytm, Zomato and Quickr crossed a $1 billion valuation this year while on the other hand Tinyowl and Housing have seen significant layoffs this year.
List Of Highest Funded Tech Startups of 2015 In India
1) Ola
India’s largest taxi network company secured roughly Rs. 3,299 crores ($500 million) in funding in November 2015 . Ola announced that it has seen 30% growth rate in the last year. Ola now has around 1 million taxi booking every day.
Ola Founder’s :- Bhavish Aggarwal, Ankit Bhati
Headquarters: Bengaluru
Type of Business: Taxi aggregator
Funding in 2015 ($ Million): 900
Founded In: 2011
Investors in Ola :- Tiger Global, SoftBank, Matrix Partners, Sequoia Capital, Steadview Capital, DST Global, Falcon Edge Capital, Didi-Kuaidi, DST Global, ABG Capital, GIC, Accel Partners
2) Paytm
Paytm is valued around $3-4 billion and it is Indias most used mobile wallet with a user base of 100 million. Paytm has go approved license from RBI to set up a payments bank which enables it to Savings and Current account deposits.
Paytm Founder :- Vijay Shekhar Sharma
Headquarters: Noida
Type of Business: Mobile wallet and e-commerce
Funding in 2015 ($ Million): 890
Founded In: 2010
Investors in Paytm: Alibaba Group, Reliance Capital, Intel Capital, SAIF Partners
3) Flipkart
Indian most famous and popular e-commerce company Flipkart is the most valued at over $15 billion, The company threatened to go app only and then took a u-turn with Flipkart Lite.
Flipkart sold approximately 8 million items in 2015 had a GMV of over $300 million ( approx Rs. 1,945 crore) during the Big Billion day which was of 3 days instead on 1 in 2015.
Flipkart’s Major acquisitions were AdIQuity, FX Mart, Appiterate.
Flipkart Founder’s :- Binny Bansal, Sachin Bansal
Headquarters: Bengaluru
Type of Business: Online retail
Funding in 2015 ($ Million): 750
Founded In: 2007
Investors in Flipkart :- Accel Partners, Tiger Global, Naspers, GICI, coniq Capital, Baillie Gifford, DST Global, Morgan Stanley, Sofina, Vulcan Capital, Steadview Capital, Dragoneer Investment Group, Qatar Investment Authority, Greenoaks Capital, T. Rowe Price
4) Snapdeal
According to news report Snapdeal is valued at $6.5 billion, Snapdeal acquired Freecharge, Exclusively, MartMobi, RupeePower, Reduce Data and Letsgomo Labs in 2015, Snapdeal relaunched Shopo, an app-only zero commission marketplace in July 2015 and is in quick competition with it’s rival Flipkart.
Founder’s of Snapdeal :- Kunal Bahl, Rohit Bansal
Headquarters:Delhi
Type of Business: Online retail
Funding in 2015($ Million): $500 million
Founded In: 2010
Investor’s in Snapdeal :- BlackRock, SoftBank, Nexus Venture Partners, Myriad Group
5) Grofers
Grofers was in news in November 2015 for raising Rs. 800 crores ( $120 million ) And in the series D round Grofers acquired Spoonjoy, Townrush and MyGreenBox.
Founder’s of Grofers :- Albinder Dhindsa, Saurabh Kumar
Headquarters:Delhi
Type of Business: Grocery delivery
Funding in 2015($ Million): 165
Founded In: 2013
Investors in Grofers :- Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital, SoftBank
Website: www.grofers.comAlso View :- Famous Entrepreneur And Their Unique Business Cards
6) Quikr
Indian online classified website Quicker has launched a chat messaging service for users and raised $150 million in series H from Tiger Global and AB Kinnevik. The company launched Quickr Jobs, Quickr Cars and Quickr Homes.
Founder’s of Quikr :- Pranay Chulet and Jiby Thomas
Headquarters: Mumbai
Type of Business: Online classifieds
Funding in 2015($ Million): 150
Founded In: 2008
Investors in Quickr :- AB Kinnevik, eBay, Tiger Global, Nokia Growth Partners, Matrix Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, Warburg Pincus and Steadview Capital.
7) E-com Express
This company was founded by former Blue Dart Employee which received around a $133 million investment from private equity firm Warburg Pincus in june 2015. This company has around 8000 employees and has presence in around 320 deliveries in 210 cities in India.
Founder’s of E-com Express: TA Krishnan, K Satyanarayana
Headquarters: Delhi
Type of Business: E-commerce logistics provider
Funding in 2015($ Million): 133
Founded In: 2013
Investors in E-com :- Warburg Pincus, Peepul Capital
8) Oyo Rooms
This startup was founded by a 21 year old Ritesh Agarwal, Oyo Rooms has become a household names across india which has received a funding of $ 100 million in August 2015 by SoftBank.
Founder :- Ritesh Agarwal
Headquarters: Gurgaon
Type of Business: Budget hotel accommodation
Funding in 2015($ Million): 125
Founded In: 2013
Investors in Oyo Rooms :- DSG Consumer Partners, SoftBank, VentureNursery, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Greenoaks Capital and Sequoia Capital
9) Practo
Practo is a online healthcare platform which raised $90 million in its Series C funding in 2015 and acquired InstaHealth, Qikwell and hospital appointment scheduling platform a month later. Practo is currently present and operational in 4 countries. Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia and singapore.
Founder’s of Practo :- Shashank ND, Abhinav Lal
Headquarters: Bengaluru
Type of Business: Finding and booking doctors appointments/ Practice management for doctors
Funding in 2015($ Million): 120
Founded In: 2008
Investors: Matrix Partners India, Sequoia Capital, Google Capital, Tencent, Sofina, Altimeter Capital
10) Zomato
Founder(s): Deepinder Goyal, Pankaj Chaddah
Headquarters: Gurgaon
Type of Business: Restaurant discovery/ Food delivery
Funding in 2015($ Million): 110
Founded In: 2008
Investors in Zomato :- Sequoia Capital, Vy Capital, Info Edge India Ltd, Temasek
11) Pepperfry
Founder(s):Ambareesh Murty, Ashish Shah
Headquarters: Mumbai
Type of Business: Furniture marketplace
Funding in 2015($ Million): 100
Founded In: 2011
Investors: Norwest Venture Partners, Bertelsmann, Zodius Capital, Goldman Sachs
12) Saavn
Headquarters: New York City
Type of Business: Music streaming
Funding in 2015($ Million): 100
Founded In: 2007
Investors: Steadview Capital, India Internet Group, Bertelsmann, Tiger Global
13) Shopclues
Shopclues has become a leading name in indian household to buy products online at a reasonable rate. Shopclues received around $ 100 million investment in it’s series D round of funding. Shopclues gets around 50 million visitors every month.
Founder’s of shopclues :- Sanjay Sethi, Radhika Aggarwal
Headquarters: Gurgaon
Type of Business: Online retail
Funding in 2015($ Million): 100
Founded In: 2011
Investors in Shopclues :- Nexus Venture Partners, Helion Venture Partners, Tiger Global
14) Yepme
Yepme is a online fashion brand in india which sells it’s products on market places like flipkart, snapdeal and on it’s website also. The website is optimised for mobile view for slow internet users and also has iOS, Android and Windows Application.
Founder’s of Yepme :- Vivek Gaur, Sandeep Sharma, Anand Jadhav
Headquarters: Gurgaon
Type of Business: Online fashion retail
Funding in 2015($ Million): 97
Founded In: 2010
Investors in Yepme :- Capricorn Investment Group, Helion Venture Partners, Khazanah Nasional Berhad
15) Freecharge
Founder’s of Freecharge: Kunal Shah, Alok Goel
Headquarters: Mumbai
Type of Business: Mobile wallet
Funding in 2015($ Million): 80
Founded In: 2010
Investors in Freecharge :- InnoVen Capital, Sequoia Capital, Tybourne Capital, Sofina, ru-Net Holdings
